


Pilot Eyes

by lannisterslioness



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family, Fluff, Rey Solo, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-18
Updated: 2016-04-18
Packaged: 2018-06-03 01:17:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6590764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lannisterslioness/pseuds/lannisterslioness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Hey, uh, have you ever heard about pilot eyes?” Poe blurted out, trying to break the bit of silence between them that only let his mind wander about the pretty Jedi who was sitting at his side. </p>
<p>“Pilot eyes? What’s that?” Rey asked curiously, her blushing subsiding and being replaced by curiosity. </p>
<p>“My dad used to tell me all about it when I was a kid, he said that you can tell when a child will be a great pilot, because if they had a parent that is a great pilot and they get the same eyes as that parent, that they’ll be a great pilot as well.” Poe stated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pilot Eyes

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: This is based off of a post that 18tpaz on tumblr made and then was awesome enough to ask me to write! As soon as I started writing this I knew I couldn't stop until it was completely done, and I'm glad I did that because I fell in love with this idea the more I wrote it. I hope you guys enjoy it!

    Poe had started to spend a lot of time with Rey ever since she returned with Luke; they briefly met before she left, awkwardly hugging her upon celebrating when the map was complete, and once while visiting Finn in the medical bay, but it wasn’t until Rey came back and BB-8 was so eager to see the person he’d dubbed  _ Friend-Rey _ that Poe truly got to spend more time with her. At first they talked about the adventure Rey went on with BB-8, from her finding the little droid on Jakku and saving him from a Teedo, to their great escape with Han Solo to Takodana, and Poe had to admit that he hadn’t been on an adventure like that in quite a long time. After the exchanging of stories, they then bonded over their love of ships and small little friendly arguments of who the better pilot was - challenging one another to races. 

 

    Needless to say, they had become close friends in a short amount of time, BB-8 usually being the one to bring them together during their free time and sharing stories. Poe’s stories were usually more adventurous in nature, Rey watching him and getting completely lost in the tale; and while Rey’s were mostly tales of survival, Poe listened to them with the same attention, offering her comfort when she needed it to let her know she wasn’t living on Jakku anymore. This went on for a while, until the day Rey mentioned his parents. 

 

    “I still remember the day I found a manual to one of those A-Wing fighters, the kind your mom used to fly. It’s a shame I could never find one intact though, they were supposed to be fast little ships.” Rey said, sitting in the lower compartment of the Falcon with Poe and BB-8 sitting above, handing her the tools when she needed them. 

 

    “Wait, how do you know what ship my mom flew?” Poe asked curiously, handing her the wrench she asked about a moment ago. 

 

    “Oh.” Rey said, taking the wrench from him and her cheeks slowly turning a bright shade of red with his brown eyes on her and a smile on his face. “I, uh...I was going through the Resistance files, I was just looking for - I mean, looking at what the Resistance did back in the day and I came across your parents names...I sort of read all about them.” Rey sighed. 

 

    “Hey, that’s alright, it’s in the system.” Poe shrugged. “I’m just surprised you remembered.” 

 

    “Your mother sounded like an amazing pilot, one of the best actually.” Rey beamed, her hazel eyes filled with excitement and for a brief moment before Rey climbed out, he swore he saw something familiar in them. “Can I ask you something?” She asked, a flash of nervousness suddenly crossing her face. 

 

    “Anything.” Poe answered, and couldn’t quite understand the flutter in his chest he got when Rey’s smile returned bigger than ever at his response. 

 

    “What were your parents like?” She asked so innocently that Poe couldn’t help but grin in return. “I mean, I know it’s probably a weird question but, they just seemed like real heroes and-” 

 

    “I’d be happy to.” Poe cut her off in her nervous babble. 

 

    Poe told her all the stories he knew about his parents, the ones others had told him and the ones he had heard from his parents himself. He told Rey about how they met, how he was a bit of a surprise to the both of them at the time being born in the middle of a war; he even told her about the Force tree that Luke gave his parents that he watched grow in his backyard and that he wondered how big it had gotten to this day. He old had eight years of real memories of his mother, he wished he had more, but right as he was working up to telling Rey that his mother had died when he was a kid, he remembered that Rey lost both of her parents when she was only five, she would barely have any memories of her parents, if any at all. 

 

    “Do you uh...do you remember your parents at all?” Poe asked, he knew it was a delicate topic for Rey, she had spent so many years waiting on the same planet, though she could have left at any time once she learned to fly, and they never came back. 

 

    Rey looked like she was about to say something, but she hesitated, almost choking on her own words before looking right at Poe and saying something completely different. “You and your mom seem a lot alike, I mean you're both great pilots, I wish I could have met her.” 

 

    She was changing the topic, Poe didn’t want to pry much beyond that, if she didn’t want to talk about it, he wouldn’t make her, so he decided to just play along and go with the way she changed the conversation. 

 

    “Thanks, I think you two would have gotten along.” Poe smirked. 

 

    “You think so?” Rey asked, almost self consciously. 

 

    “Yeah, I do.” Poe laughed a bit, scooting closer over to Rey and unable to fight off that feeling of butterflies when she blushed and gave him a small smile in return. He hadn’t felt this nervous being around a girl since the flight academy, and he wasn’t quite sure if he should be having these feelings about Rey. “Hey, uh, have you ever heard about pilot eyes?” Poe blurted out, trying to break the bit of silence between them that only let his mind wander about the pretty Jedi who was sitting at his side. 

 

    “Pilot eyes? What’s that?” Rey asked curiously, her blushing subsiding and being replaced by curiosity. 

 

    “My dad used to tell me all about it when I was a kid, he said that you can tell when a child will be a great pilot, because if they had a parent that is a great pilot and they get the same eyes as that parent, that they’ll be a great pilot as well.” Poe stated. 

 

    “You have your mom’s eyes then.” Rey said. 

 

    “Yeah, he used to tell me all the time that I had my mom’s exact eyes.” Poe smirked. 

 

    “I guess that’s why you’re such a great pilot then.” Rey admitted sheepishly, blushing a bit again before shaking her head and trying to think up something else to say. “What about Luke then? I hear he was a great pilot, do you think he has his father's eyes then? I’ve heard that Leia has her mother’s eyes, so Luke must look like his dad.” 

 

    “I think so.” Poe said. He never heard much about Anakin Skywalker, though he knew Luke and Leia were not afraid to talk about their father, despite what he became. He knew Anakin had been a great pilot, and a great Jedi before he turned, but that was all he ever knew about the Skywalker. “I’ve heard Leia was a pretty good pilot too, it must mean her mother must have been a good pilot too.” 

 

    “A whole family of pilots.” Rey mumbled, almost sadly, Poe knowing she was probably thinking about family now, he wanted to distract her from the subject, but she kept it up this time. “Do you think one of my parents might have been a pilot?” 

 

    Poe turned to look at her, he was studying her face, seeing the loneliness in her eyes that she always desperately tried to hide. But there was something in those bright hazel eyes that he couldn’t help but think was familiar. He looked at her probably a few minutes longer than he should have, Rey squirming around a bit and getting uncomfortable under his gaze, but in those last few moments before he looked away with a slight blush himself, he realized why Rey’s eyes looked so familiar. He’d seen them before, back when he was a kid and the same ship he was sitting on had landed in his front yard with Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa on board as well, along with Chewbacca of course. They were the eyes of one of the pilots he’d admired most as a kid, aside from his mother, they were the same hazel eyes as Han Solo. Even though Poe looked away, he had Rey practically etched into his mind, and the more he thought about it, the more resemblances he noticed not only between Rey and Han, but Rey and Leia as well. 

 

    Rey had Leia’s beauty, and while Poe thought it embarrassing now that he worked for the General herself, but back when he was a kid he not only admired Leia, but had a bit of a childhood crush on her as well - puppy love. He thought Leia was the most beautiful person in the entire galaxy when he was younger, and then there was Rey with the same delicate features and undoubtably the same bravery as Leia herself. But Rey also had Han’s wit when she let it out, not to mention her piloting skills, and as he’d come to learn Rey was as stubborn as a bull when she wanted to be, almost as stubborn as he remembered Leia describing Han Solo. Rey was undoubtably a combination of the two, their daughter, and while he’d never say it out loud unless he was sure, he just knew. 

 

    “I think one of them was a pilot, maybe even one of the best pilots.” Poe smiled, still not wanting to look at Rey after their awkward moment. “But whatever talent you have, that’s all you. You learned how to fly on a desert planet all by yourself, if that’s not the mark of a true pilot, I don’t know what is.” 

 

    Almost instantly Rey wrapped her arms around him, pulling him in for a close hug and just holding him there until he hugged her back. Rey had come a long way in a few months, from hating being touched after being so used to being on her own, to wanting to hug everyone she could, it all starting with Poe. 

 

    “Sorry.” Rey said, pulling away from the hug and sniffling a bit, though Poe didn’t see any tears falling from her face. “I just...thanks.” 

 

    “It’s true though. You’re one of the best pilots I’ve ever met.” Poe assured her with a quick rub of her back before pulling away, wondering if that contact was a bit too much for their friendship as it stood now. 

 

    “Good enough to beat you in a race?” Rey asked with a smirk, brightening up and looking as eager as ever. 

 

    “I wouldn’t get ahead of ourselves here, I can still beat you.” Poe laughed. 

 

    “Prove it, flyboy.” Rey was beaming, not knowing the effect the tone of her voice and her closeness was having on Poe as she leaned over to speak. 

 

    “You’re on.” Poe quickly replied and got up to his feet. “I’ll race you around the planet, last one back without using lightspeed has to clean the winners ship.” 

 

    “Fine.” Rey said as she rose to her feet with a grin. “But I’m warning you, this ship may be old, but she  _ did _ make the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs.” Rey gloated as she made her way past Poe and to the cockpit to warm up the engines. “Let’s go, it is a race!” She called from the cockpit. 

 

    Poe couldn’t help but smile as he got off the ship, Rey was without a doubt the daughter of Han Solo and Leia Organa, but past that she was something more important - she was someone he was slowly falling in love with for the first time in ages. Despite all that however, he was so going to beat her in their race, there was no way he was going to be stuck with cleaning out the Millennium Falcon. 


End file.
